List Name

Grades

The Terrorist Booktalk

Grades

6–8

Eleven-year-old Billy Williams was on his way to school, the London International Academy, running up the subway steps, when a guy stopped him and said, “Your friend dropped this,” and handed him a package wrapped in plain brown paper. He took it, even though he didn’t remember either of his friends carrying a package, just their bookbags. The signs and warnings at Heathrow Airport flashed into his mind, and he remembered the fire drills at school that the older kids called bomb drills.

Laura, Billy’s older sister, is determined to find out why her brother was chosen, and who decided he had to die. What does a terrorist look like? Laura discovers that sometimes they don’t look all that different from someone you’d see on the street, in a restaurant, or in a class at school.

This booktalk was written by librarian and booktalking expert Joni R. Bodart.